Women warriors in literature and culture
Woman warriors figure in many mythologies and legendary accounts, often partly based on historical incidents. The classical examples are the Amazons of Greek mythology, partly based on Sarmatian or Scythian women.
The Rigveda mentions a warrior queen named Vishpla, who lost a leg in battle and had an iron prosthesis made, and returned to warfare.[1]
There is a woman in the Old Testament, Deborah, who may be one of the first recorded instances of a woman participating in battle. She was a prophetess, a warrior, a leader, and a Judge of Israel, all in one. She correctly predicted that the enemy general, Sisera, who faced Israel at this time would be slain by a woman (the woman who killed him and also received credit for the army's victory was named Jael). This story is chronicled in Judges.
Jael assassinates Sisera, a retreating general who was the enemy of the Israelites, according to Judges 5:23-27.
Gordafarid, a warlike maid, firm in the saddle, and practiced in the fight, resembling the classic image of an Amazon, appears in Old Iranian tales:
She hid her tresses under a helmet of Roum, and she mounted a steed of battle and came forth before the walls like to a warrior. And she uttered a cry of thunder, and flung it amid the ranks of Turan, and she defied the champions to come forth to single combat. And none came, for they beheld her how she was strong, and they knew not that it was a woman, and they were afraid.
---Ferdowsi, "Šāhnāma" ("Book of Kings")
In Scandinavia, women who did not yet have the responsibility for raising a family could take up arms and live like warriors. They were called shieldmaidens and many of them figure in Norse mythology. One of the most famous shieldmaidens was Hervor and she figures in the cycle of the magic sword Tyrfing. The Danish chronicler Saxo Grammaticus relates that when the Swedish king Sigurd Ring and the Danish king Harald Wartooth met at the Battle of Bråvalla, 300 shieldmaidens fought on the Danish side led by Visna. Saxo relates that the shieldmaidens fought with small shields and long swords.
Similarly, the Valkyries of Norse mythology are minor female deities, who serve Odin. The name means choosers of the slain or "Chanters of the slain" . The valkyries' purpose was to choose the most heroic of those who had died in battle and to carry them off to Valhalla where they became einherjar. This was necessary because Odin needed warriors to fight at his side at the preordained battle at the end of the world, Ragnarök.
A legend which may be based on the Greek Amazons appears in the history of Bohemia. As the story goes, a large band of women, led by a certain Vlasta and her henchwoman Šárka, carried on war against the duke of Bohemia, and enslaved or put to death all men who fell into their hands; eventually, they were mercilessly defeated by the duke. In the 16th century the Spanish explorer Orellana asserted that he had come into conflict with fighting women in South America on the Marañón River, which was named after them the Amazon or river of the Amazons, although others derive its name from the Indian amassona (boat-destroyer), applied to the tidal phenomenon known as the "bore".
The armored warrior maiden (whose gender is often unsuspected) is a frequent character in the European chivalric epic. The most famous of these female knights is Bradamante -- daughter of Aymon, sister to the knight Renaud de Montauban (Rinaldo, Ranaldo) and legendary ancestor to the house of Este -- who is destined to marry the knight Ruggiero (or Rugiero). Her adventures are a major element in the Italian Renaissance epics Orlando innamorato by Matteo Maria Boiardo and its continuation Orlando furioso by Ariosto. A similar character is the pagan warrior knight Clorinda who battles against the Christian crusaders in Torquato Tasso's epic Jerusalem Delivered. In his epic The Faerie Queene, Edmund Spencer devotes one chapter to the story of a female knight, Britomart, who is an example of Christian chastity.
The vogue of such female knights in literature would continue though the seventeenth century and inspired not only dramatic recreations but also actual military feats (such as the duchess of Montpensier's participation in the Fronde). The best known historical Medieval Amazon characters are Sichelgaita of Salerno, Joan of Arc, queen Margaret I of Denmark and Jeanne Hachette.
These epics sometimes contained still closer parallels to the legends of the Amazons. Orlando furioso contains a country of warrior women, ruled by Queen Orontea; the epic describes an origin much like that in Greek myth, in that the women, abandoned by a band of warriors and unfaithful lovers, rallied together to form a nation from which men were severely reduced, to prevent their regaining power.
According the legendary history of Britain,[2] Queen Gwendolen fights her husband Locrinus in battle for the throne of Britain. She defeats him and becomes queen.[3]
According the legendary history of Britain,[4] Queen Cordelia (on whom the character in Shakespeare's King Lear is based), battles her nephews for control of her kingdom, personally fighting in battle.
The Finnish female deity associated with forest and hunting was Tellervo. Female hunters seem to have been known in Finland also in distant prehistory as depicted in rock paintings.
See also
- ^ "A Brief Review of the History of Amputations and Prostheses Earl E. Vanderwerker, Jr., M.D. JACPOC 1976 Vol 15, Num 5".
- ^ Geoffrey of Monmouth, translated by Lewis Thorpe (1966). The History of the Kings of Britain. London, Penguin Group. pp. p.286.
{{cite book}}:|pages=has extra text (help) - ^ Geoffrey of Monmouth, p.77
- ^ Geoffrey of Monmouth, p.286